The Truth About Fear

Award-winning author, international speaker, and former radio show personality.

As I look through the news, I see the world submerged in water, facing impending war, senseless murders and violence that all culminate in crippling fear. Everywhere we look, we are inundated with the negative possibility of what is and what could be. More and more, fewer and fewer people are looking to the future with hope and optimism. Many (too many) view the world with fear. These days, the idea of relaxing into a moment can easily be unsettled by a simple flash of news from a computer or phone screen. In these times, it seems the only way to get away from the world is to shut off all technology and go live off the grid. Our lives and news feeds have become nothing more than images of death and destruction that bombard us at every turn.

I am not afraid of a lot of things. I wouldn’t think twice about going to South Korea. I can easily handle spiders, major life changes, and monsters under the bed. But some of the things that I have been afraid of in the past would have taken me to my knees. The thoughts that were ruled by fear took my mind to a place where Stephen King wouldn’t even want to visit. Fear can be a game changer in one’s life. It is so powerful that just when you think something is going well, fear can rear its ugly head, and in an instant, something that was once seemingly pleasant or even normal turns dreadful and crippling. Fear can take someone’s love, goals, and faith and twist them until there is nothing left but the broken pieces of what was once hope.

The thing about fear is that people are rarely equipped to completely eradicate it. Typically, the best we can do is acknowledge our fears and then just be present with them, trying not to allow them to completely consume us. Once we are present with fear, it is easier to disassociate with the limiting or heart-closing belief that prompted the feeling. Dr. John Goldthwait (2007) explained it in this way: “When you become nonattached to something that has closed your heart and you let it go, your heart spontaneously opens and your experience of whatever you had closed your heart to transforms.” In essence, fear can never take from you what you are unwilling to give it. The key is to not attach to the fear and to open our hearts and move toward a place and space of love. But for many, fear becomes the enemy because we allow it to take us over, and we end up giving over to its control. It cripples us when it dictates our lives and stifles our dreams. Then just for good measure, the fear shows ourselves and the world a shadowy, dark, unhappy side of who we are—not our truth (inner divinity). Ironically, most of the fears that we have are about things that have yet to happen (and probably never will).

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think that there is anything wrong with being afraid from time to time. I liked to simply think of (some) fears as an extreme way our unconsciousness gets our attention. Sometimes, we just need our fight-or-flight mechanism intact to safely navigate life until we have complete, unadulterated faith in the divine. Until then, without fear, we’d all be standing in line to bungee jump without the retracting rope.

So here is what I suggest: embrace fears as they can be great teachers. If we can take time to just sit with our fears and try to understand them, then we have the opportunity to find the massive amount of hidden wisdom that is buried beneath the surface of the problem (fear). Once we have it uncovered and can look at it as the objective viewer, it can open our heart, bringing us back toward our divine potential. In essence, fear can be viewed as positive as long as we keep it in perspective.

The trick to that is we just need to remember that we are not the fear! It is also important to remember that underlying all fear is the belief that we are separate, alone, and powerless from source, from God. But that is only the ego talking; it is not our truth.

Remember, “Fear is the worst use of your imagination” and the TRUTH of who you are is more powerful than any fear you hold!

2 comments

You can certainly see your enthusiasm within the paintings you write. The arena hopes for more passionate writers like you who aren’t afraid to say how they believe. At all times go after your heart. “Until you’ve lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was.” by Margaret Mitchell.